
The Hamburg Robotic Telescope HRT
is a project for the
observation and monitoring of activity phenomena on cool stars.
HRT is an automatically operating telescope
which is equipped with a fibre-fed Echelle spectrograph.
The 1.2m telescope was manufactured by
Halfmann Teleskoptechnik,
an enterprise located near
Augsburg, Germany. The telescope was tested at Hamburg Observatory during 2003-2004. Commissioning was in 2005.
The only instrumentation is the HEROS spectrograph
of the Landessternwarte Heidelberg which is connected with the telescope via a fused silica fibre. First spectroscopic light was
in autumn 2007. Since that time, spectroscopic observations of cool stars have have been carried out but were restricted to the
blue channel of HEROS. Commissioning of the red channel will be in summer 2009.
Future
It is planned to install the telescope at another site: at La Luz in central Mexico (altitude 2400m). La Luz is the astronomical observatory
of the University of Guanajuato. An agreement between the University of Hamburg and the University of Guanajuate was subscribed
at the end of 2008. The Mexican partner will start with the installations (building) in 2009.
Scientific goals
- Follow-up observations of X-ray sources
- Simultaneous observations with space telescopes
- Determination of stellar rotation periods
- Observation of stellar activity cycles
- Stellar butterfly diagrams (differential rotation)
- Observation and monitoring of starspots
- Search for low-mass stellar companions
- Spectroscopic surveys